


Baby Girl

by humanbean



Category: Glee
Genre: Gen, I refer to this as The Sad Dalton Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-11
Updated: 2019-08-11
Packaged: 2020-08-23 19:19:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 827
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20197039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/humanbean/pseuds/humanbean
Summary: “You know,” Diane says mildly, “Dalton does have a sister school.”Jane's mother doesn't hate the Dalton idea, but she has some Concerns.





	Baby Girl

“You know,” Diane says mildly, “Dalton does have a sister school.”

Jane peers up from the Dalton brochure that she’s had her nose buried in since dinner. “I think I could like it at Dalton.” Her beautiful baby girl, grown tall and brave and so eager to please, turns to her daddy and says, “What do you think, could I be a Warbler?”

Diane thinks if she listens closely enough, she can hear the sound of a trap snapping shut.

* * *

Diane starts looking into the transfer process to Crawford Country Day. Just in case.

* * *

Jane is waiting when they pull up outside the school, and tosses her bag ahead of her into the backseat before she climbs in. Her head thunks against the window like she’s abjectly exhausted.

“How was school, honey?” Diane asks.

"Good," Jane says, but she looks like she might start crying, the kind of tired and unsettled that sometimes pitches her to her breaking point.

Jon’s eyes are on the road as he pulls onto the main road. He hasn’t seen the look on Jane’s face.

“Did you find Mr Anderson like you wanted to?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Jane replies, and oh_, that’s_ what’s happened. “He brushed me off. I mean, he _said_ the choir decides these kinds of things and not him, but he said it like he was brushing me off.”

“The choir _does_ decide,” Jon says, and he still hasn’t looked back. “He wasn’t lying to you. They’re big on democracy at Dalton. It’s the kind of thing you’d like.”

Jane doesn’t answer, and it’s only when Diane turns to look back over her shoulder that Jon thinks to sneak a glance at her in the rear-view mirror. “Oh,” he says, forehead creasing up in the familiar, quite cute puzzled expression that Jane inherited from him. “Well. Up and at ‘em, okay kiddo? You’re in control of your own destiny. It’s not that bad, okay?”

“Okay,” Jane says, and then closes her eyes and sleeps for the rest of the drive home.

* * *

It’s late, and Jane is either going to be in bed or still sitting up at her desk, puzzling over equations. Jane is a bright girl, and she figures it out, eventually, but Diane is making a mental note to call up her old math tutor again when she turns the doorknob.

Jane is in bed, covers pulled up to her nose, but her lamp is on and her eyes, peeking out over the top, are open.

“Hi, baby,” Diane says, coming into the room, “I thought you’d be asleep.”

Jane doesn’t need to know that ‘hoped’ is the word Diane was looking for. She doesn’t answer but she watches, with her little peeking eyes, until Diane comes close enough to sit on the bed and kiss her forehead.

“Mama?” And Jane’s voice is so _small_, she doesn’t sound this small very often anymore. “I don’t want to go to Dalton anymore.”

Diane has been waiting for this day to come since Jon first got the idea into his head to send their little girl to an all boys’ school. She rests her hand on Jane’s head.

“Okay,” she says.

Jane sticks her head the rest of the way out of the covers. “Okay?” she says. “You’re not mad?”

“Of course I’m not mad, sweetheart.”

“And… you don’t think Dad will be disappointed in me?” Jane asks. “For giving up?”

Diane’s heart clenches. “_Never,_” she says, and kisses Jane’s forehead again. “Never for doing what’s best for you. Let him even think the word disappointed, I’ll kick your daddy’s ass. Don’t think I won’t.”

Jane giggles, because Diane just _swore._ “I know you will, Mama.”

“I know I said I wouldn’t, but I’ve been asking at Crawford Country, and they’d be happy to take you,” Diane says. “I know it’s not the Warblers, but I bet you can find enough nice girls at Crawford who like to sing to start your own choir. Maybe as the founding member you’ll get first pick of all the good solos.” Diane isn’t a singer, but Jon is, and Janie is, and she pays attention.

Jane blinks sleepily. “What if…I wanted to go to McKinley High School instead?” she asks. “Rachel Berry has a choir there. She’s a really good teacher.”

She yawns, and Diane pets her head. “We’ll talk about it in the morning, baby,” she says. “Go to sleep.”

“Okay,” Jane says, and then, “Love you.”

“Love you too,” Diane says. She closes the door on her way out, and then goes straight to her computer and looks up everything she can find about McKinley High School.

* * *

Three weeks later, Diane comes home to find Jane huddled over a notebook with a very polite boy who stands up to shake her hand when he introduces himself. Jane sneaks a few little glances at him, when she thinks no one’s looking, and Diane knows that she’s going to be okay.


End file.
